


This.

by ariphyll



Category: RWBY
Genre: (Loosely) Canon Compliant, Emotional Confliction, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-10
Updated: 2020-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:21:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23097022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariphyll/pseuds/ariphyll
Summary: Life is full of cycles. Around and around they repeat.
Relationships: Qrow Branwen/Clover Ebi, Qrow Branwen/Summer Rose
Comments: 14
Kudos: 47





	This.

**Author's Note:**

> Every day I yearn for more Team STRQ information but until then _I_ get to make up the past dynamics.

This wasn't going to work.

The fall of his chest, the peace on his face, the-- _everything_ about Clover right now wasn't going to work. There was too much for Qrow to suffocate on in the night atmosphere around them. His body itches to gain some space away from the heat Clover is radiating, but he feels frozen. 

This whole- _night_ had been great. It was terrifying.

Qrow couldn't point out how or when but he _knows_ that

_this_

_won't_

_work._

It felt all too familiar. The same patterns and motions of his life were coming full circle once again, and Qrow knew this. Another bad decision to taint his hands with. And yet-- if he could just--

.

.

.

This wasn't going to work. 

Qrow sits up in bed, running a hand through his hair. He needs air, space, somewhere that isn't enclosed by four walls. He feels his body naturally slip into his daily self as he gets up - a grown-ass man who manages to stay calm and collected. Someone who acts his age instead of panicking like he's twenty all over again. Yes, this wasn't going to work and that was-- fine. Fine. 

"Qrow...?"

Qrow glances over his shoulder as he makes eye contact with Clover, half-awake but fixated on him.

It was fine.

Another bad decision.

They end up late for the morning briefing.

\---

"What was your team like?"

How many times has Qrow fielded this question? _We were great, incredible, perfect - before we all fucked up. The end._ That answer usually isn't appreciated, and Qrow doubts Clover will break the mold here.

Qrow sips at his soda - the carbonation acting as only a faint memory for the burn of whiskey. "We were one of the best to come out of Beacon."

"So I've heard." Clover drums his fingers against his own glass. "Call me rude, but I'm just curious what the people _Qrow Branwen_ worked with are like."

Qrow scoffs. "Hasn't ol' Ironwood already told you everything?"

"About Salem - not really you."

That sentence-- Qrow clenches his jaw. Always fishing for more out of him, digging nails in so deep Qrow is positive he would have physical scars. ‘ _Just getting to know one another’_ conversations never left Qrow with any sense of ease.

The sting of this burns just as hot as alcohol. 

"Well, it was me, my sister, Tai - Ruby and Yang's father - and Summer. Ruby's mom." There, barebone descriptions. Be done with it.

Yet, Clover watches him intently, leaning into the conversation. A cat watching a bird on a branch. "I've heard sparring descriptions from your nieces." 

Qrow pauses before nodding. "Tai lives back in Patch. Wonder if we ever get Amity up if I'll be able to contact him." It wasn't like paper mail did much nowadays.

"I can't imagine why not. I'm sure your nieces would be glad to talk to him." Clover takes a drink. "What about your sister?"

Qrow tightens his grip on his glass, shifting his hard gaze down at the ice. Raven. The sorrow he felt for his old friends ended when it reached her, instead shifting into a mutilated form of fury. 

He sees too much of himself in her - if he stares at the mirror too hard.

Clover brushes his hand against Qrow - so casual it would appear like an accident to anyone else. "Right, got it." He lets an apologetic pause slip by before continuing. "Summer… She's, passed away? Correct?"

"Yeah. A few years after Ruby was born."

Qrow can feel his mind twitching, itching for this discussion to end. What did it matter? That was the past, this is the present-- why the hell did it matter?

...She never mentioned where she was even going. Always so eager to pry out secrets and trust from everyone else, but never return it. Help for others and others only.

"I'm sure that--" Whatever Clover is going to say doesn't matter either. Qrow leans forward to cut him off with a kiss - a bit juvenile of a way to end the topic, but it worked.

Bad decision.

But it worked.

\---

Qrow watches Clover from across the truck, watching him idly flip through a book as they head to the tower. He isn't sure if Clover is even reading the pages if he's honest. Perhaps just gazing over them, taking in the information that matters before moving elsewhere.

It was so methodical, watching his movements. Skilled. Precise.

It always bothered Qrow that other people's hands could feel so warm on his skin.

He takes a deep breath - centering his wandering thoughts before letting his eyes close. This wasn't going to work, so he should just end it. Why not just do it right here? It wasn't like this needed some glorious end.

Just a casual conversation. Nothing but some background noise of the moving truck to interrupt him.

It wasn't going to work. So he should end it.

He opens his eyes again. What would she think of him now?

\---

It's something of a mantra Qrow has developed over the years. No matter the face, the voice, the _person_. Always the same.

_I am not a charity case._

His semblance unlocked at an early age - or, more likely, developed a _name_ back then. His birth turned his own mother into a corpse, so he would argue it's always been there. A danger, hanging on the heads of everyone around him.

Even so… He was born to this problem - and he would be the one to handle it.

_I am not a charity case._

Summer was a gift from the day they met at Beacon. She may have talked too much and was too easily fooled, blinded by her own positivity and hope in others. A bit manic at times, overboarding herself with work, and yet-- kind. Always so kind.

Kind in the way she looked at him. Genuine and warm. Her name matched her eyes.

Qrow regrets the day he saw nothing but pity there instead.

_I am not a charity case._

Clover had that same choking aura about him to Qrow. Bright and energetic, and even though he kept a calm front, Qrow could _feel_ it. Energy and life thrumming right beneath the surface.

His eyes were kind too.

Only kind.

~~So, where is it? Where is the pi -~~

_I am not a charity case._

Qrow knew it was a bad idea the moment Summer came to him. But working month-long missions is tiring, and lonely, and so _miserable_ to deal with at night. Sex wasn't. Sex was easy and intimate, and Qrow could close his eyes and ignore the look in hers and it would work out. It wasn't agony. It would work out.

It would never work out.

Summer was a good friend. She was kind and warm and supportive. It felt like holding sunlight at times. Yet, the burns started to overtake the heat she provided.

"She didn't know who she was unless she was helping somebody." 

Qrow told that to Ruby and Yang, long ago when they were kids staring up at him with eager eyes.

_I am not a charity case._

Qrow knows it is a bad idea the moment he lets Clover take him to his room the first night. It doesn't entirely stop the consecutive nights after, however, nor does it stop the hazy mornings where Qrow can't quite leave early. 

Sex is easy.

And yet...

This isn't the same.

This… isn't the same; this isn't the same; this _isn't_ the _same_ . Qrow repeats it over and over in his head as he watches Clover get dressed. Every relationship is supposed to be different, _is_ different. This isn't the same.

Clover smiles over at him. Qrow smiles back.

This isn't going to work.

_"I am not a fucking charity case."_

\---

"I'm not something you can _fix_."

Summer had looked hurt but not in the way she should've. She didn't look like a rabbit wrongfully shot, but instead like the hunter who alerted her prey.

She wasn't a cruel person. Qrow knew that. They were young and twenty and struggling with Ozpin's missions, and some days a future seemed impossible and-- There had been a comfort between them. Comfort that would twist itself enough to fit the two of them before it cracked.

Qrow didn't feel any sadness when she fell in love with Taiyang. The years that had gone by aside, it felt- _different_ . It felt authentic and real in their interactions, her _comfort_ finally finding someone else's that matched. Qrow was happy for her.

That energy never would've worked. It would never have worked.

_She didn't know who she was unless she was helping somebody._

Qrow isn't lying to himself when he says he doesn't love her. An idyllic crush born of the hormones and desperation of his youth wasn't love. No, he grew to be quite comfortable as one of her dearest friends - always there when needed but kept the right distance away.

He is lying when he says he's past the relationship.

\---

"What are you worried about?"

Qrow looks up from the papers in front of him at Clover's question. "Excuse me?"

"What are you worried about? Here? With us?" Clover's face is calm and collected.

"Uh- nothing?" Qrow glances around the room, but suddenly the morning report in front of him felt far away. "Should I be preparing for something?"

Clover chuckles a bit, but it quickly dies down. "No, no. I mean… _us_. You've seemed--" Clover pauses as his face visibly searches for the right word. "--hesitant."

Qrow tries to find his spot on the paper but fails, switching over to staring at his fingernails instead. "..Don't know what you mean."

"Qrow."

He glances up at Clover's soft tone, unable to help meeting his eyes. Kind eyes. 

"What do you want to do?"

Nothing good can ever survive without a name, can it? Things are born and created and then they are given a name to seal them. Strengthen them. His own name - tethered to him as a sign of his life.

He is being asked for a _name_.

Qrow gives a quiet sigh, bidding what little time he has. "I don't know." Honest answer. Regretful answer.

Clover just smiles. "That's okay." The look he gives Qrow is so familiar- so eerie in form to those days long ago but---

Different.

It's still different.

Summer's look always had that glint to it - a desire, a yearning, to reach inside and craft a perfect world in his chest. To right every wrong in the universe was the mission she placed on her own shoulders.

Her look burned in all the wrong ways. Suffocating, digging, pressing -- it didn't work with him.

This is different.

Clover's look runs cool instead of hot. Qrow could sense it under there - the selfish desire every human has, to heal every wound they come across. Yet it remains calm and still underneath the waters, beckoning but patient.

The heat Qrow feared at the start has shifted into silent seas.

_Wouldn't you just drown instead of burn?_

"I don't want you under any sort of pressure here," Clover says.

Summer was such a romantic growing up, pouring over romance novels and fairytales. Life itself was a romance, a love beyond belief. That love took form, many forms, but never matched quite up with his. 

"But I'd love to take you out for a date sometime. A proper one."

This wasn't love either. But...

Qrow smiles. "Maybe."

\---

  
  


_(This)_

  
  


"Pfft. You don't know my _friends_ . That's how it _always_ goes."

  
  


_(Isn't)_

  
  


"Why couldn't you just do the _right thing?!_ Instead of the thing you were _told?!_ "

  
  


_(Going)_

  
  


"I trust James _with my life_ … I wanted to trust you."

  
  


_(To)_

  
  


… _good luck ._..

  
  


_(Work)_

**Author's Note:**

> I have two hands: one for fair game and one for hummingbird but also a secret third hand, dedicated to character introspection.
> 
> Follow me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/mlm_catboy) if you want, or if you prefer more dead platforms, [tumblr](https://ariphyll.tumblr.com)!


End file.
